This 38-year-old man has cremated 10,000 unclaimed bodies over last 19 years

Popularly known as ‘Body Miyan’, Ayub Ahmed's work reinstates one’s faith in humanity. He takes unclaimed bodies to mortuaries and later performs their burial, or last rites.

Came to be known as ‘Body Miyan’, it was the thought of humanity, and kindness towards every human being, that inspired him to take up this extraordinary work.

Ayub was travelling to Gundulpet in a bus, when he noticed a huge crowd gathered around a body. What shocked him was that he found the body at the exact same spot when he returned 10 hours later. This incident left a deep impact on him.

Ayub takes care of the bodies in the same way a relative or friend would. He first tries to identify the next of kin and if he not able to find anyone, he performs the burial or last rites himself.

Hailing from Mysuru, 38-year-old Ayub has been doing this work for the last 19 years, and has performed the last rites for thousands of bodies. While he says that though he does not keep a count of the number of rites he has performed, the estimate could be nearly 10,000.

Also known as Ayub Ji, he mostly receives the information soon after the police does. Once official formalities are completed, he goes to recover the body. Apart from a manual search, he also posts the picture of the unclaimed dead body on Facebook.

If someone comes forward, Ayub hands over the body. At times, the families give around Rs 50 or Rs 100 to express their gratitude. However, if no one comes forward, he goes ahead and performs the last rites himself.

Ayub faced tremendous opposition from his parents, and had to run away from home. He came to Bengaluru, and started working at a water purification plant. While at Lal Bagh, he came across a body, and decided to hand it over to the police.

Ayub then realised this was a good deed and returned to Mysuru to continue with his work. He has never looked back since.

Read this in Hindi

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